Posts Tagged ‘Google’

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Google+ Plus or Minus?

Thursday, July 28th, 2011

The new social networking service, Google Plus, had a successful start but is having trouble staying afloat.  Last week, their total number of visits dropped, and the next few weeks will most likely be crucial to its success.

Google+ is great social networking site.  It allows you to upload posts, photos, separate your friends into circles, and even live video chat with multiple people.  The concept is awesome, but more people need to keep using it!

The site’s visits dropped from 1.86 million two weeks ago to 1.79 million total visits last week.  The site initially had regularly growing traffic, but even the time spent on the website has started to decline.  The average amount of time spent on Google+ decreased from 5 minutes & 50 seconds to 5 minutes & 15 seconds.  This may not seem like that big of a deal, but if the drops continue, Google+ may lose its buzz altogether.

Google+ had a booming launch, but it seems to be running out of fuel.  More people need to get on and stay on the social network for it to stay up and running.  The loss Google+ has experienced is not enough to tell whether or not it will be a success, but it needs to gain some momentum.

So everyone upgrade to Google+ so you can have “hang outs” with multiple friends at the same time—no matter where you all are!  This could either be the next Facebook or a dud, but only we have the power to make it rise or fall!

Whaddyathink?

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Google in the middle of dilemmas, controversies & peace-makings

Thursday, July 21st, 2011

Google Virus: What you need to know

Not sure what that link is? DON’T CLICK IT! Google has announced that over two million people have been affected by a bug in their computer.  The virus directs web traffic results to sites of fake security programs and other scams.  Google says the malware got into their computers from about one hundred variants of fake antivirus software and that a few million machines were affected.  You will know if your computer is affected because a big, yellow warning will appear at the top of your Google search page that you can’t miss.

All PC’s beware of what you click and find ways to clean out your computer! Visit eZanga News again next week for more tips!

Competitors vs. Google

The multiple antitrust complaints against Google have brought about an investigation on the company.  However, many oppose this case.  All of Google’s supporters argue that antitrust laws are for consumers, not competitors.  They believe that the company should only be questioned if the monopoly is abusive and immoral, such as price fixing.  But Google’s inferior competitors are the only ones complaining, and Google consumers are completely satisfied.

Consumers can switch to any other search engine whenever they wish, but there is no reason for them to if they’re happy with the site, and that is simply just business competition.

Break-ups and Make-ups

Google has also recently settled its dispute with Copiepresse, a company that was complaining Google was unlawfully using their online newspaper information in their news site since 2006.  Google removed the company from its search engine results page—thinking that would be what they wanted—and Copiepresse complained they were boycotting them.  The two companies finally came to an agreement, and Google has re-included Copiepresse into their search index.

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Facebook Friday – Battle of the Bands

Friday, July 8th, 2011

Google+ Plays a Tune for Facebook

After taking the spotlight from MySpace, a social networking site that prides itself on its music sharing capabilities, Facebook has reigned supreme in nearly every other facet. Most would say, however, that Facebook is seriously lacking in the music sharing department.

This sore spot has been left open to potential competitors, and it seems as though Facebook will meet its match once Google’s social network launches. Google+ is reported to feature:

  • Easy sharing of YouTube music videos – the most popular of all videos watched on YouTube
  • Group Listening Parties – a hangout where “circles” can listen to music together
  • Live Sessions – the possibility for musicians to perform and interview live, in real-time
  • Music Storage – storing and sharing of music files
  • Android Apps – integration between music apps and Google+ on smartphones

So, watch out, Zuckerberg, Google+ is coming to steal your fans.

 

Facebook’s Planned Solo Performance?

But wait! Are there secret plans for a new Facebook music service? Jeff Rose thinks so. The software developer reportedly cracked the code while downloading the file used to run the new Facebook video chat feature, which was announced just this past Wednesday.

Rose says a string of code which includes the phrase “facebook.vibes” hints at a music service that is already in the works. In his tech blog, Rose announced that “The vibes app connects with a music download dialog in the page though, so I’m guessing that with this release we are seeing the seeds for Facebook’s upcoming music offering.”

So, maybe Facebook does have a shot at staying on stage! Which are you most looking forward to? Google+ or a more music-friendly Facebook?

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Exploring and Explaining Google Plus

Tuesday, July 5th, 2011

By now, you have probably heard some buzz about Google Plus, but haven’t been able to find out much about it.  In case you haven’t heard of it at all, Google Plus is Google’s social networking site, meant to be an extension of Google and integrated into its other products.  It is still in field testing, so only a limited number of people have been able to try it.  But the fact that I can’t try it myself yet makes me even more curious about it!

I have spent endless hours trying to find out as much as I can about the new project and taking the interactive tours, so that when I finally get my invite I can jump on-board and immediately get the most out of the project.  While it is Google’s answer to Facebook, it has a very different user interface and can at first seem very confusing to people that are used to Facebook.  So while I’m sitting here waiting for my invite, I’ll break down some of the features that make Plus so innovative and different from Facebook.

  • Circles: Organize your friends into circles, similar to friend lists on Facebook and Twitter but much easier to manage.  While it takes many steps to add a Facebook friend to a friend list, you can simply drag and drop friends into Circles.
  • Hangouts: Hangouts let you video chat with a group of friends and let others know where you are so they can stop by.
  • Sparks: This content recommendation system lets you select topics you are interested in and recommends articles, pictures, and video that you can share with friends.
  • Photos: This feature allows you to upload photos and, unlike Facebook, actually edit them right there.

What do you think of Google Plus?  Will you be trying it out or are you perfectly fine sticking to Facebook and Twitter?

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Oh La Vache Google!

Wednesday, June 29th, 2011

The French search company 1plusV is suing Google for $425 million—the largest case against them in Europe—for unevenly promoting their own services ahead of their competitors.  Google allegedly delisted 30 of their search engines between 2007 and 2010—consequently hurting the French company.

1plusV claims that Google is preventing the development of its competitors by only listing selective websites in their search results.  The company is suing Google for the amount of business they believed they lost due to Google’s alleged immoral business practices.  However, Google claims that their search results are not influenced by humans.

Google search methods are on close watch by the EU probe and US competition authorities for all of these antitrust complaints.

This is the third time 1plusV has filed a lawsuit against Google.  In February 2010, they filed an antitrust complaint with the European Commission and again in February of this year (http://www.telecompaper.com/news/1plusv-files-fresh-ec-competition-complaint-against-google ).  Microsoft has also filed the same complaints against Google, with such branches as Foundem and Ciao.  In March, Microsoft claimed that Google had prevented Bing search engine from listing on YouTube that was owned by Google.

If it’s true that Google’s ad service is unfairly knocking down competition, then they might be in some big trouble!

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Google Chrome shines with new Google Voice Search, Search By Image, and Instant Pages right on your desktop!

Tuesday, June 14th, 2011

Google Chrome has polished up with some new features for your desktop, including Google Voice Search, Search by Image, and Instant Pages.  These new attributes make surfing the web easier, quicker, more efficient, and more fun!

Google Voice Search is compatible if you have a microphone in your laptop or desktop and contains voice recognition of the user’s speech.  Simply click the microphone at the end of the search bar and say your search!  Google says their voice recognition is not perfect, but they are continuing to analyze data of the results, increasing quality and word traffic on their website.

Search by Image is also a new feature that allows you to drag-and-drop image search in the search bar itself.  The camera at the end of the search bar permits you to upload any image from your computer.  Google does its best to identify what’s in the picture and gives you search results regarding that picture.  Instant Image Search also pulls up results for you as you type in your search into Google Images.

The new version of Google Instant also brings us Instant Pages.  We already get results as we’re typing in a Google search, but now we get something called Instant Pages.  This predicts which pages you will select and preloads those top results in the background while you’re still choosing a link.  If you choose one of the links Google anticipated, the page is already loaded when you click it—saving you at least 2-5 seconds each search!

Google Chrome has expanded its new search features from just mobile devices to desktops and laptops anywhere.  Surfing the web has bewitchingly become almost hands-free and is continuing to advance tremendously as we speak.

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Attention eBook Worms! Is the iBook 1.3 Update Generating a Loud Shout with its new Read Aloud Feature–or No Sound At All?

Thursday, June 9th, 2011

Apple has advanced eBook reading with the new iBook 1.3 update, presenting a read aloud feature in select books with automatic page turning, highlighting words, automatically playing audio & video content in the books, and improvement on downloading large books.  Or has it?  Users have experienced a few glitches with the update—encountering silent narrators that make us wonder whether we should have went with Amazon Kindle or Google eBookstore instead.

The iBook iOS app update is free, requiring iOS 3.2 or higher, and is compatible with the iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad.  It has Apple’s usual appealing, sleek characteristics with some modernistic features.

The iBook 1.3 contains read aloud for select children’s books.  The app is also capable of highlighting words as they’re being read, helping children learn to read.  There is a picture of a speaker at the top of the app, and the user simply taps the speaker to enable sounds.  There is also an option of turning the pages manually or automatically in this menu.

Books including multimedia content, such as audio or video, will automatically play on iBook 1.3, as well.

The update also acts more efficiently with larger books than before.  There used to be incidents of the app displaying the same page twice, but this new update has corrected that issue.

However, there are definitely glitches with this update.  It is said to have difficulty functioning on the iPad and iPhone 4 on the latest iOS.  When the read aloud is selected, the pages will turn properly, but there is no sound.  Apple is aware of this glitch, and I’m sure they will have it perfected shortly, as they always do.

Some critiques with iBook also include that it is not supported by any other devices, while its competitors most certainly are.  Kindle can be read on iPad, iPhone, Kindle and PC’s, and Google eBooks is supported by iPad, iPhone, Android devices, and any JavaScript-capable web browser.

Electronic book worms everywhere are stocking up their virtual shelves, and Apple needs to fix these glitches before they slither over to Amazon or Google!

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Web Traffic Report: IPv4 Addresses versus Oncoming IPv6 Networking; World IPv6 Day and Internet Protocol for Dummies

Thursday, June 9th, 2011

World IPv6 Day was a 24hour test of the new Internet Protocol 6—the next generation of IP addresses—in retaliation to the current IPv4 exhaustion that is creating web traffic around the world.  So what the heck does that mean? This is Networking 101, explaining to all of us who don’t understand those complex computer terms exactly what is going on with our IP addresses and why we’re running out.

Internet Protocol is the main communication system used for transmitting digital data between internet connected computers.  Devices recognize each other by their IP addresses.  In order for information to transmit, each device needs a separate address.  We currently run on IPv4, or Internet Protocol version 4.  This means that every device’s unique IP address consists of four groups of numbers that gives them access to the internet.  Every time you connect your mobile device, you are assigned a different IP address.

However, due to the exponentially increasing number of devices that can now access the internet, our combinations for IPv4 addresses are sold out.  This is known as IPv4 exhaustion, or how the restricted availability of address space is coming to an end.  Once we run out of IP addresses, we will have to wait until one becomes available to connect to the internet—unless…

We start switching to Internet Protocol version 6.  IPv6 is a six unit numeric address, providing 4 billion times more addresses than before.  It will allow any individual to have multiple IP addresses with plenty more to spare.  It’s rumored that we will never need to update from this if we make the switch.

On World IPv6 Day, major companies—such as Google, Facebook, Yahoo!, Microsoft and Verizon—all did 24hour test runs of the new system for promotion of switching.  We will be following up with the results of their tests.

There are still many IPv4 addresses that are not in use, but most likely all new devices will have IPv6 addresses.  There are many concerns with the new system, such as security, cost, and methods of actual migration of all devices to it.

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New Gmail Service Courteous.ly may not be so Considerate

Wednesday, June 8th, 2011

Courteous.ly is the new free app, currently exclusive to Gmail, which scans your inbox periodically and informs other people whether your current email load is light, normal or high. This tool benefits the users by providing etiquette cues for email thereby increasing efficiency and possibly reducing stress.

What some users may not know is that Courteous.ly is actually part of a social experiment by Georgia Tech, assistant professor, Eric Gilbert. Aside from helping the general public, his main goal is “to understand if exposing hidden aspects of social media makes the media better.”

While I definitely see how Courteous.ly can be useful in certain settings such as in the business world, in the social world this innovation in email will probably morph the “To Accept or Not Accept a Relative’s Friend Request” dilemma into the “To Send or Not to Send When the Load is High” dilemma and can lead to several implications.

If people know your email load is high, they may politely wait until later to send you an email in order to increase the likelihood of your response. If their email is urgent, they may make their message more concise thereby increasing efficiency.

However, if people see your email load is low and you fail to respond in a timely manner, you may lose some credibility.

Nowadays, we voluntarily give out personal information like our home address or our favorite ice cream flavor to social media sites, such as Facebook, with rarely any benefit to us. When was the last time Ben and Jerry’s sent a pint of Cherry Garcia to your front door in exchange for your fandom?

Will Courtous.ly make more people polite and revolutionize the way we send email or is it TMI that can do more harm than good?  Tell us your thoughts!

 

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Google’s Got a Shiny New Toy: Chrome OS Notebooks Are Here

Thursday, May 12th, 2011

Google is bringing the world of cloud computing to the next level.

Introducing Chromebooks, Google’s first PC, which operates a little differently from typical laptops. All of its functionality is completely web-based. This means that, unlike Windows or Mac OS, there is no desktop. Everything is done via applications which access the all-powerful cloud, as they run through a modified version of the Chrome browser, Mashable reports.

This design is rather ingenious, as it makes for a device which requires less memory (and is, in turn, lighter and thinner than alternatives), boots up almost instantaneously, and enjoys a rather long battery life.

And even though the operating system is web-based, many of the apps used to do various things, like watching movies, word processing, or even playing games, can actually function without a constant internet connection, thanks to offline versions, says MTV Mulitplayer. In fact, Google has already announced the launch of “Angry Birds Chrome”, which somewhat surprisingly, is available for free on Chrome browsers.

The laptop will hit the market June 15. Samsung and Acer are the first two companies who will be offering the machines, and for a reasonable price, due to the machine’s streamlined design. The Samsung model will have a 12.1-inch screen and starts at $429, while Acer’s version will sport an 11.6-inch screen and starts at $349.

Will you be grabbing a nicely polished Chromebook?

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